Opinion: Colors make it easy to fall in love with autumn

Well, Presidents’ Day is pretty lame. It celebrates the birthdays of presidents Washington and Lincoln on a day that is the birthday of neither. Both were great presidents, but why single them out for a holiday? Why not a holiday for the Roosevelts?

Presidents’ Day consists pretty much of a day off for some workers and some Presidents’ Day store sales. Halloween allows for a month of selling a whole slew of costumes, indoor and outdoor decorations, candy and other junk food for the celebration. Cash receipts aren’t as big as Christmas, but they are a strong second. Lame, indeed.

I know, I know, kids love Halloween; they love to dress up in costumes and see how much candy they can amass.

Hopefully, the children this year will suffer no more than a sugar overload from all the goodies.

Go ahead, call me an old sorehead, but a holiday that frolics with the dead is pretty lame.

Actually, this column isn’t about Halloween; if it were I would have written it in time to for it to appear prior to Oct. 3l. In reality, my Halloween rant serves as a lead-in for a salute to the golden season of autumn.

I believe autumn is right up there alongside spring as a glorious season. I just think it’s a shame that Halloween is the best we can do for a holiday to serve as a symbol of the season, as Independence Day is synonymous with summer. I know that Thanksgiving is an autumn holiday, but it has become a kickoff to the Christmas shopping season, with little association with autumn.

By the time this is read, the autumn leaves will be mostly gone, and the bareness of winter will be so near that I could borrow from the title of a spring song, “It might as well be winter.”

There is so much to like about autumn. I’m sure some might give credit for creating the beauty of the season to nature, or the more poetic among us might say it’s Mother Nature. As for me, the credit goes to God.

In autumn, the sweltering heat of summer yields to a climate laced with a distinctive chill in the air, calling for an occasional light jacket. Hints of the winter to come are in the air. Enjoy the season while you can. One day may bring frost, the next glorious warmth that some call Indian summer. Surely, such delicious days are matched only by those in early spring coming at the end of a drab winter.

The stars of the brilliant light show of autumn are the leaves. Produced by whomever you give credit for the miracle, leaves change colors before falling to earth.

That’s why it’s also called fall. The leaves change from spring greens to the assortment of autumn colors that are a chore to describe.

If you are familiar with blues music, you may have heard of the “blue note,” which I understand to be unlike other musical notes and is so unique that it can’t be described, only heard, experienced and enjoyed.

The autumn colors are like that: reds that aren’t like any other reds; browns unlike other browns; and golds that are, well, their own version of golden. They are the colors of autumn, of fall. No descriptions are necessary just experience and enjoy.

It must be apparent that I love this season. It is a reminder that although the cold, dark winter will come, it brings a guarantee that the cycle will continue; soon, spring will bring new life.

Forgive me if I don’t want to associate the season with ghosts, ghouls, the living dead and the like. I hope you enjoyed the cute little Halloween kids and were generous with the treats; hopefully no tricks were played on you.

Thanksgiving is coming, and autumn has yet to exit.

Joe McAdoo is former chairman of the communication department at Drury University.